


always about me (talking about the only heart he knows)

by pointyshades



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies), The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Angst, Basically Spoilers for All of the Hobbit, Battle of the Five Armies Spoilers, I'm Really Serious About the Angst, M/M, post-BotFA
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-25
Updated: 2014-12-25
Packaged: 2018-03-02 22:45:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2828726
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pointyshades/pseuds/pointyshades
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And he says, "Please, please, don't go. Don't leave me." And he says it over and over again, he says it until his lips bleed and still Thorin turns his head and dies.</p>
            </blockquote>





	always about me (talking about the only heart he knows)

**Author's Note:**

> Title is taken from "Road Music" by Richard Siken.  
> I just got done watching Battle of the Five Armies and I have way too many feelings. Of course, my response to feelings is to write CRIPPLING ANGST; so here it is, and I'm sorry.  
> While I'm at it, I'd like to apologize to Tolkien, who is likely rolling in his grave.  
> Anyway, thank you for reading!

It isn't easy, coming home.

He thought it would be simple; he looked forward to it, all those days in the saddle, all those hours spent huddled miserably over the neck of a pony while the cold rain dripped down his back and the only sound was the squelching of hooves in mud. _If I were in Bag End right now,_ he thought, and pictured a huge meal spread out over the table. He'd probably eaten more of those imaginary meals than he had real ones during their travels. _If only I hadn't left,_ he would think, and then he would be right back in Bag End, bare feet comfortable on wooden floors, about to dig into the hugest cob of corn he'd ever seen.

Later, when he'd stopped regretting the adventure as a whole, he came up with other scenarios. His will might have been more resolute, but the rain was just as cold and the mud just as squelchy, and he fantasized about himself as the returning hero, with pockets full of gold and maybe a handsomely-placed battle scar or two.

_"Bilbo Baggins, the adventurer!"_ the other hobbits would say. _"Bilbo Baggins, who left the Shire and_ did _something with his life! I wish I_ _could be more like him."_

And he would beam, and he would give a humble nod in their direction and step into Bag End for the celebratory feast, during which he would be cheered and toasted more times than he could count.

Time passed. His fantasies grew less elaborate and less hopeful. He began to settle for survival: _Just let me live through this, just let me see the Shire again, please._

As he struggled to sleep on hard stone, staring at the cave ceiling and wondering when orcs would burst in and slaughter them, he pictured himself returning to Bag End. Gone were the celebrations, gone were the hobbit children who all wanted to hear his tales of adventure. He just wanted to be there. At that point, he would have given anything just to see the Sackville-Bagginses sneer at him again.

He clung to home like it was a dream that would get him through all of this. He yearned after it. He hoped for it. He missed it desperately for weeks on end, and then suddenly the journey was over and almost everyone he cared about was dead and he _could_ go home.

But it isn't easy, in fact it's nigh impossible to slip back into a life he thought he would never see again.

His neighbors stare at him like he's a ghost - a thinner, wearier, richer ghost of himself. They speak of him in hushed tones.

It's ironic that he comes back from war with his box of treasures and those treasures turn out to be all he has. His neighbors have auctioned off the rest, presuming him dead. He sits in his home and stirs up dust from the walls, from the floors, from the empty rooms. You can't sleep on gold. You can't eat treasure.

Yet he manages. If his only troubles were loneliness and missing belongings, he would recover. But he has a hole in his heart as well, one which stills the breath in his lungs and makes him feel as though he will never breathe again. _The King Under the Mountain is dead,_ it whispers. _Thorin Oakenshield is dead._

He does whatever he can to silence that voice. He keeps busy; he cleans the dust from his windowsills and gathers up what items he can find, whatever furniture hasn't taken up residence in another hobbit-hole. He forms a routine.

And if another hobbit spies Bilbo Baggins out smoking his pipe late at night, looking sad and quite a bit lost in the moonlight, well. Adventure changes people. _This is why hobbits don't leave the Shire,_ the others whisper amongst themselves, and Bilbo pretends not to hear.

 

* * *

 

Some nights, he doesn't dream. He calls those "good nights" and when he gets up in the morning, he puts a little more vigor into his pretense of normalcy. He can even go for several days at a time with no intrusion upon his life, and he calls those "good spells" and he worships them.

Then sometimes he lays his head upon the pillow and the darkness behind his eyelids is the Lonely Mountain, and without a blink he is back, he is back in the adventure and the stony halls. He doesn't call these nights anything, because during the day he prefers to forget that they exist; but they do exist, and he has to clean his pillowcases more often for the tears on them.

It will get better, he thinks. He has a full set of dining chairs now. He has shelves on which to display his newfound wealth.

He sits on the edge of his bed and kicks his feet and considers not sleeping.

"Bilbo," he tells himself, "You are going to put your head down on your comfortable pillow and pull these warm blankets up over yourself, and you are _not_ going to dream, and you are _not_ going to cry. I have had enough of damp pillowcases!"

So he puts his head down and he dreams, and he weeps.

 

* * *

 

Why did he agree to go on this adventure on the first place? It has turned his life upside-down, as predicted, and while he didn't die sometimes he wishes he had.

He told himself it was because he didn't want to stay in the Shire forever, because he finally wanted to experience the world, but in truth Bilbo was lost the moment a sad, dark dwarf struck the first chord on his harp and opened his mouth to sing about a faraway home. Bilbo loved Thorin's harp music. During their travels, the best nights were those rare ones when Thorin strung his harp and sang for them, and the rest of the dwarves joined in as a rumbling chorus. Thorin's voice was deep and sonorous, his longing evident in the careful play of his fingers over harp strings, the way his blue eyes blazed in the light from the fire.

One night, after such a performance, Bilbo found himself sitting at Thorin's side before the campfire. The other dwarves drifted off toward their bedrolls, yawning and mumbling. Thorin laid his harp aside and fixed that dark stare on Bilbo.

"Is there something I can help you with, Master Baggins?" he asked. Up to this point he had been rather cold and distant towards Bilbo, so that the hobbit sometimes wondered if Thorin even noticed his presence.

Bilbo twitched his nose. "Oh, um. Well, I suppose I was just wondering how you play so - so beautifully."

"Song is a large part of Dwarven culture," said Thorin. "If you had ever left your sheltered Shire, you would have heard Dwarven song long before now."

Bilbo didn't know what to say to something that was so clearly an insult. "Hm."

"I am surprised you have remained with us thus far. Despite Gandalf's counsel, I had doubted the wisdom of choosing a halfling to be our burglar. Hobbits have a reputation for being...soft and domestic."

"I think you'll see I'm not as uselessly domestic as you think," retorted Bilbo, affronted. "You know, this is the problem with you dwarves. You're so proud of your own culture, you never stop to consider the merit of anyone else's way of living." As soon as he spoke the words, he regretted them; Thorin had already proven himself to have quite a temper, and Bilbo had no interest in finding himself dangling over a cliff anytime soon. He opened his mouth again to apologize, but noticed Thorin regarding him with more interest than he had shown in Bilbo for the entire journey so far.

"You are a surprising one, halfling," he murmured. "Perhaps you will prove more useful after all."

Bilbo blinked.

Thorin turned away to stoke the fire, and the moment was broken. That is where Bilbo's memory ends, as well; that is where he wakes, with tears on his cheeks and harp music in his ears.

He can't even think of the harp anymore. Thorin ruined that for him, as he did too many things.

 

* * *

 

"Clever halfling," said Thorin with the barest hint of a smile, "Keeping the trolls occupied with your babble until dawn. We have you to thank for our lives, I suppose."

"Ah, Gandalf did all the heavy lifting," joked Bilbo, pointing to the massive stone where Gandalf's staff split it in two.

"True," said Thorin. "But I am accustomed to being indebted to Gandalf. You, on the other hand..." Their eyes met, and Bilbo felt a shiver go down his spine from the intensity of Thorin's gaze.

Bilbo inclined his head. "Well, you can owe me more than one fourteenth of the treasure, if you feel so grateful." He smiled to show it was a joke.

To his surprise, Thorin smiled back. "Not a chance."

 

* * *

 

Some days after his return from Erebor, Bilbo finds himself at tea with a group of vague acquaintances. He knows his invitation is largely only to satisfy the curiosity of the others there, yet he goes, because he can no longer stand being alone in Bag End with Thorin's ghost.

The host of the gathering pours tea and passes around ample snacks and for a while Bilbo can satisfy himself with eating his fill. Then, after the bare minimum of respectful silence, come the questions.

"Is it true you fought a dragon?" asks Drogo Harfoot, a hobbit who Bilbo has never spoken to at length. The look on her face is not one of admiration, but of concern.

"Hmm, well, not strictly true," says Bilbo. He's about to elaborate when another hobbit, from the Zaragamba family if he's not mistaken, interrupts.

"Were you in a war?"

"I was certainly there for the war, but whether I really participated - "

"Did _you_ kill the dragon?"

"Why did you leave the Shire in the first place?"

"What's it like to travel with dwarves?" Bilbo opens and closes his mouth, flustered by the flood of questions. Around him sit hobbits with worried expressions, looking at him as if he has physically changed after his adventure.

"Hold on," he starts to say. "Just - wait. Let me answer you one at a time."

"Who is Thorin Oakenshield?" blurts Drogo.

Bilbo's breath catches in his throat. He looks down at the tablecloth and blinks, slowly, his fingers curling around the handle of his teacup. "Thorin," he says, and it hurts just to say the name, but he has to do it if he is ever going to get over him. "Was a good...a good friend." Bilbo takes a deep breath, not noticing that the hobbits around him have fallen silent. He struggles for words, and falls short: "He was...a king, in search of his kingdom. I left the Shire because of Thorin, and I will never...never forget him."

Drogo reaches a hand out and sets it on Bilbo's. Her eyes meet his, and there is pity there.

Bilbo stands up. His chair scrapes across the floor, too loud. "I'm - I'm sorry," he says, "I have to go."

"But you've barely arrived! We haven't even finished the first course," says the host in shock. Drogo's hand is still on Bilbo's wrist, and he jerks away. Her fingers are just a bit too tight, and he pulls too hard, and his teacup falls and shatters on the floor.

He barely feels the hot liquid on his feet. "I'm so sorry," he mutters. "I've just - I've got things to do."

He flees. There is no other word for it. He flees, like a fool, like a lovesick fool who just poured his heart out in front of everyone.

Bitterly, he thinks: _At this rate I will never need to leave Bag End again; I will never be invited anywhere._

 

* * *

 

He couldn't say it then, either. "To me, he was...he was..." Too many words threatening to spill from his lips like blood, words that he was afraid would shatter him. Selfishness, too; as if the Dwarves wouldn't understand what he was saying. As if keeping his words secret was the only way he could keep Thorin.

_He was loved,_ whispers Bilbo later, to the darkness under the trees. Whether he speaks of his own feelings or the Company's love, it doesn't matter.

 

* * *

 

The first time Bilbo touched Thorin was after the fight with Azog the Defiler. A fight where, taking himself completely by surprise, Bilbo had saved Thorin's life.

"You!" roared Thorin, "What were you doing? You nearly got yourself killed!"

Bilbo was still trying to suck air into his lungs, but he felt wide-eyed and disheveled, confused by Thorin's outburst.

"Did I not say that you would be a burden, that you would not survive in the wild and that you have no place among us?" continued the dwarf. Hurt stabbed at Bilbo's heart; even after saving Thorin's life, he was still to be regarded as nothing more than a halfling, a useless creature that must be protected at the cost of the others. Bilbo cast his eyes downward, ready for the rest of Thorin's reproach.

But Thorin's voice softened. He set one heavy hand on Bilbo's shoulder, a hand that the hobbit could feel radiating warmth. "I've never been so wrong in all my life," proclaimed Thorin, and suddenly Bilbo was wrapped in the most crushing embrace he had ever had the luck to experience.

It would be the only time that Thorin embraced him. Later, Bilbo replays it, reliving in his mind the breathless emotion of the moment. At the time, however, he only felt as though his ribs were going to crack. Ironic, he thought briefly, that he should be killed now after surviving the battle with the orcs.

Thorin pulled back and held Bilbo at arm's length. The other dwarves were cheering, slapping Bilbo and each other on the back. But oh, Bilbo had eyes only for Thorin, and his heart pounded maddeningly hard in his chest.

That piercing blue gaze seemed to see right through him, into his deepest soul, and Bilbo didn't mind one bit. Thorin leaned closer, and Bilbo found himself swaying forward to meet him, drawn to the dwarf as if by a power beyond his control.

"You have proved yourself beyond a doubt, Master Baggins," murmured Thorin, his voice too quiet for any but Bilbo to hear. "I owe you a debt. Is there any way I can repay it?"

Later, in his dreams, Bilbo is bolder. "Yes," he says, "There is. Kiss me, Thorin son of Thráin."

He imagines those blue eyes closing, the eyelashes fluttering against his cheek. Or: "Is there any way I can repay it?" Thorin whispers, and Bilbo holds him wordlessly, wraps his arms around the warm, sturdy chest and says, "One thing only, Thorin Oakenshield. One thing only."

"And that is?" breathes Thorin against his ear.

"Don't leave me," says Bilbo, and before his lips can meet Thorin's he is awake, his cheeks are wet with tears and the familiar walls of Bag End close in around him.

"No, no," he cries, and punches a weak fist into his pillow.

"Come back, Thorin, please."

 

* * *

 

In truth, he is not so poetic. "Is there any way I can repay it?" asked Thorin, and Bilbo swallowed, a blush rising to his cheeks. Too many ideas swarmed through his head, and he was still floating on the relief of surviving the battle.

The moment passed him by. Thorin regarded him and nodded, face an unreadable mask. "I will find something for our burglar," he said, and turned away.

_Fool,_ Bilbo calls himself later. _You had your chance._

 

* * *

 

They shared more confidences, after that. Before it became too dangerous to light a campfire, before they had to live only with the cold and the wet for companions, Bilbo would often find himself seated beside Thorin as they held their hands out to the flickering flames. Or Thorin would sit out on first watch, but his vantage point was a rocky outcropping with room for two, and Bilbo would bring his bedroll and sit beside him in silence.

It was the most intimate thing they shared, this silence, and so Bilbo treasured it. He was not a fool - he had come to realize how his heart beat faster every time he was near Thorin, how he could scarcely breathe when the Dwarven king looked at him with those sky-blue eyes. If it wasn't love, it was infatuation, and Bilbo was only too eager to fuel it. Whenever he could, he strayed closer to Thorin, whether that meant sitting beside him at night or walking silently next to him during the day. The other dwarves gave no sign of having noticed anything, yet Bilbo was sure that they had. When Bombur handed Bilbo his nightly measure of stew, was there a knowing look in his eyes? When Glóin helped Bilbo up after he tripped on a tree root, did his tight grip hold some warning?

_He cares for you only as a friend, if that. Let it go before you are hurt._

"Master Baggins," rumbled Thorin as Bilbo joined him under the stars. "You do realize that sitting watch only requires one set of eyes, yes?"

"True, but who will keep the owner of those eyes awake, should he begin to nod off?"

Thorin bristled. "I do not sleep on watch."

"I don't doubt you," Bilbo hastened to add. He shivered, wrapping his arms around himself in the chill night air. "But do you ever sleep?"

"Of course," Thorin began, but Bilbo cut him off.

"You've taken first watch for every night that we've been on this journey, and when one of the younger dwarves has been too tired to take their own watch, you've replaced them without a word of complaint. When do _you_ sleep? If you're not careful, by the time we reach the Lonely Mountain you will have no energy left with which to battle Smaug." Bilbo watched Thorin carefully for the effect of his words. It was a risky thing to say, but Bilbo had noticed the dark circles growing under Thorin's eyes since they'd left Mirkwood and he had no wish to watch the king exhaust himself any further.

Now Thorin nodded slowly. "As much as I loathe to say it, you raise a good point, Master Baggins."

"Please, Bilbo is my name. Feel free to use it." He looked up at Thorin with a smile, and was rewarded with another thoughtful nod.

"Very well, Bilbo." It made him shiver, to hear his name said in that deep and gravelly voice. He managed to play it off as the cold night breeze, and pulled his dressing gown tighter about him as he sat. "I appreciate your interest in my health. But Dwarves are far more robust than Hobbits, and we need less sleep as well."

"That doesn't mean you need no sleep at all," Bilbo pointed out.

Thorin scowled at him. "I'm not finished. As I was going to say, it is more important that the younger members of our company get their rest, for many challenges await us and they need their full strength. I, on the other hand, am capable of conserving my energy and using it where it is needed. I assure you that I will not run myself into the ground needlessly."

"But I think that's exactly what you would do, if it was for your kin. Kíli and Fíli are your nephews, right?"

"Right."

"If they continued to plead exhaustion for every watch they were assigned for the rest of this journey, would you stand in for them, regardless of who else volunteered?"

Thorin gave a grudging nod.

"You see," said Bilbo, "This is the kind of attitude that's going to ruin you. You're the _king_ of your _people,_ Master Oakenshield. I understand that you want to protect them, but in order to do that you have to protect yourself." He looked earnestly up at Thorin, urging him to understand. "Please, you don't have to shoulder all this responsibility alone."

Thorin stared back at him with those bright blue eyes. His skin was like molded porcelain in the moonlight, his hair a shroud of darkness falling about his shoulders. Bilbo wanted nothing more than to hold him close and rub the anger and worry out of his features, but he knew Thorin would never be at peace until he had reclaimed his ancestral home. And he knew that his urge to touch - to hold, to treasure - would likely be taken amiss.

Their eyes remained locked for a moment that felt like a lifetime, and then Thorin looked away, glancing over the landscape before them. To Bilbo's surprise, he chuckled, a rumbling sound deep in his throat and chest.

"Very well," he said. "You just don't give up, do you?" His gaze drifted back to the hobbit. "I promise to stop taking as many of the watches, and to allow my comrades to carry more of the...burden of responsibility that I hold. Is that enough for you?"

Bilbo stood, not bothering to suppress the grin that sprang to his face. "Definitely. Thank you, Master Oakenshield." He dipped his head once more and walked away, towards his bedroll and the promise of at least that meager warmth.

Behind him, a voice called out. "Oh, and Bilbo?"

He turned, picking out Thorin's figure in the darkness. "Yes?"

"Thorin is my name. Feel free to use it."

His smile was one of pure happiness as he stared at the Dwarven king. For a moment, he forgot to be cold.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes the weight of his grief is so much that he forgets Fíli and Kíli are dead too. Then he feels even worse: shamed for forgetting them, as well as upset over their deaths. But he didn't hold them in his arms as they died. He didn't watch the light go out of their eyes. His name was not the last word on their lips, as it was on Thorin's.

And when he sleeps, he dreams not of Fíli, playfully swatting his brother on the arm; nor of Kíli being teased by the other dwarves for his weak beard stubble. No, Bilbo sees one thing over and over again, and it is Thorin Oakenshield, lying still in death.

The dreams start in the same place. Bilbo walks across the ice, bare feet slipping and sliding and freezing. Sting, his sword, hangs by his side. But it is useless. No amount of weaponry will save Thorin now.

Before him, a dark shape lies silhouetted against the frozen landscape. Bilbo hurries towards it, and at the same time he tries to slow, tries to drag his feet; the space between him and the figure sprawled on the ice is a mercy, a weak barrier against his pain.

He arrives, as he always does, at the same time too late and too early.

Too late, because Thorin is already dying. A hole gapes in his chest, red with his life's blood. It pumps out, staining his cloak and armor, pooling onto the ice beneath him. There is red also at the corner of his mouth, on his chapped and fragile lips. He gasps for air. It is a terrible sight, a King brought down to a shade.

Bilbo approaches him, falls on his knees at Thorin's side. The dwarf manages a movement of his head, a weak motion that brings Bilbo into his line of eyesight.

"Bilbo," whispers Thorin. And it is here that Bilbo is too early, too quick to Thorin's side - because if he had taken longer across the ice, he would not have to listen to Thorin's last words, would not have to hear, over and over again, his gasp and struggle for air. It is a terrible thing to think, and even worse to wish. But Bilbo does wish it, sometimes, because it hurts too much. It is too much that he should have to see Thorin dying every time he closes his eyes.

"I am sorry that I made you part of my perils," croaks Thorin. His breath catches in his throat, and for a moment Bilbo thinks this is the end. But Thorin blinks, and forces breath into his lungs again, and Bilbo lowers his head, tears pooling in his eyes.

"No, no," he cries. "I am glad to have shared in your perils. It is more than any Baggins deserves!"

Sometimes, he changes the dream. Sometimes, instead of "I am glad," he says, "Don't say that, Thorin. Don't say that. You're going to live."

Or: "Kiss me, please, while still there is time!"

Nothing ever works. Bilbo begs and pleads, but Thorin answers the same, continues his slow and inexorable death speech. And he says, "Please, please, don't go. Don't leave me." And he says it over and over again, he says it until his lips bleed and still Thorin turns his head and dies.

"Go back to your armchair, Bilbo," coughs Thorin, his skin growing paler and the pool of blood growing larger. "And your books. Plant your tree. If everyone valued home like you do, the world would be a merrier place."

The first time Bilbo watched Thorin die, it was over before he realized it. Thorin shifted in his arms, eyes moving and refocusing on a point just over Bilbo's shoulder. His great hands went limp at his sides.

"No, no, Thorin!" cried Bilbo, and he kissed him for the first and last time. His lips, pressed to Thorin's, tasted the dwarf's blood. He felt weak breath against his mouth, and then nothing, and Thorin Oakenshield was no more.

It is the one part of his dreams he cannot bear to alter. Night after night, he kisses the King Under the Mountain, and each time it is a kiss of death, ending at the same time as Thorin's life and leaving Bilbo's face wet with tears.

_Maybe it's a good thing that he died before he realized what I was doing. Maybe he would have hated me, maybe he_ did _hate me in his last moments for making more out of our friendship than he wanted to give._

It's too hard to think such things. He settles for dreaming, and waking paler and sadder each time, a sad excuse for a Hobbit wasting away in his hole.

In the morning, he rises and he plants Thorin's acorn outside his front door.

Maybe it too will die and leave him.

 

* * *

 

He was so afraid of facing Smaug. It seems silly now that he has faced so much worse and lost so many friends. But he was terrified, he was shaking and weak-kneed before going in to see the dragon. The dwarves lined up to wish him good luck.

Balin slapped him on the back cheerily. "You'll do fine, Bilbo."

Bilbo swallowed heavily, unable to trust his voice in response.

The others spoke to him in turn as he moved down the line, but he forgot each encouragement as soon as it was spoken, his own terror swallowing everything in its path. A dragon. He was going to face a _dragon._

Thorin was the last. He rested one hand on Bilbo's shoulder and smiled, a rare thing from Thorin. "Ready for what lies ahead, Master Burglar?"

"Oh, no. Definitely not." Bilbo gave a weak smile and tucked a hand in his pocket, instinctively seeking the ring buried there. "But today is as good a day as any to die, yeah?"

Thorin shook his head, taking Bilbo's joking words too seriously. "None of us here wants you to die, Bilbo. We wish you luck. In the best case scenario, you will not even wake the dragon."

"Hm." Again, he couldn't trust his voice. He stared wordlessly up at Thorin, seeking strength in those burning blue eyes.

Maybe it wasn't strength, but he found something there. The other dwarves seemed to have melted away behind him, fading into the stone. There was only Thorin, and he was beautiful.

One heavy pat on his shoulder and then the hand was retracted. "I have faith in you," said Thorin. Again it came over Bilbo, that desire to touch, to reach out a hand and place it against Thorin's face. He almost gave in this time, when it seemed he was about to go to his death anyway. But he held back. Always he held back, and the next time he saw Thorin the dragon sickness would already be upon him, and those blue eyes would be shadowed with lust for gold.

He reached again, nervously, into his pocket. The ring was there, as it was always there.

Bilbo ducked his head as he moved into the stone archway. "Thanks," he mumbled to Thorin, and he headed down into the dragon's lair.

 

* * *

 

Some of his dreams are based on memories of physical terror, rather than emotional pain. He prefers these, even, because no one dies except him.

Like the one where Thorin holds him over the ramparts of Erebor, and there is fury in his eyes and a determination in his tensed arms.

"You betrayed me!" he roars.

In that moment, more than any other, Bilbo thinks he is going to die.

Thorin's hands are clenched in the fabric of his coat. At any other time, Bilbo would appreciate the closeness. Now he feels only raw terror surging up his throat, his chest heaving with it. Thorin presses forward, over him. Bilbo wants to cry out but his voice won't respond.

"You robbed me of my birthright. You _stole_ the Arkenstone from me," growls Thorin. Behind him, the dwarves shout. They pull at him, futile hands clutching at the king's shoulders. Thorin has eyes only for Bilbo - and oh, how long he has waited for that, but it is all wrong. Bilbo wanted a quiet night and a tender connection. What he gets is Thorin's fury, Thorin's hatred. His eyes blaze with anger. The wind whips his long hair about his face, his sharp nose, his chiseled features. His teeth are bared in a snarl, and for one horrible moment Bilbo looks at Thorin and sees only Smaug, sees only the dragon fighting to keep his treasure hoard.

Bilbo makes a small, muffled sound. Thorin's hands are at his throat. Thorin is choking him, and now this is where the dream differs from reality, this is where Gandalf spoke up and saved him.

In the dream, there is no one to save Bilbo.

The dwarves are gone. The sun descends, the air chills about him and he can't get enough into his lungs because Thorin is choking the life out of him, his beloved is choking the life out of him -

Except Thorin was never that, not to Bilbo.

Friend. Enemy, now. Never that.

"Please," he mumbles around the thickness in his throat. "Please."

Those wonderful blue eyes are dark with hatred, with dragon sickness.

"Please."

He wakes up shaking and alone in his bed. His hands fly to his throat, but of course there is no mark there. _It's not real,_ Bilbo reminds himself. _It's just a dream._

Bilbo forces himself to go out. He walks about the Shire and sees the familiar sights. He smokes his pipe outside amongst the flowers. None of it helps, not one bit.

 

* * *

 

There is a knock at his door. Bilbo eases it open, peering around the edge into the sunlight.

It's Drogo Harfoot. She shifts from foot to foot and tries on an uneasy smile. "Hello, Master Baggins."

"That's me." He doesn't open the door any further.

"We...your neighbors, that is...we wondered if you wanted to come over for a spot of tea?"

"Which neighbors? You live halfway across the Shire."

Drogo shifts again and runs a hand through her curly hair. "Well...all of us. We're worried about you, Bilbo Baggins. We'd like to make sure you're alright."

_This is because of the wandering,_ Bilbo thinks, _And the looking lost and the crying at odd hours. Hardly subtle, Bilbo._

Aloud, he says, "Well, thank them for their concern. But I'm quite alright. Just trying to...get through some things." He pastes a smile onto his face and moves to close the door, but Drogo steps forward and grabs the edge of it. It's awfully forward for a Hobbit, and that's what makes him pause and consider her.

"I'm really fine, I promise," he says.

Drogo shakes her head. "I don't think you are."

The seconds tick by. From here, Bilbo can just see the spot where he buried the acorn, but he refuses to look at it. What if it hasn't grown?

"Did you love him, this Thorin?" asks Drogo. The question comes out of nowhere, and Bilbo's shock must be visible on his face, because Drogo smiles sadly. "It's obvious you cared for him a great deal, Bilbo. The way you reacted at the tea - and before that, at the auction - love is nothing to be ashamed of. But you called him a friend, and I just wanted to know...if you loved him?"

It hurts, but not as much as it did before. Bilbo looks out past Drogo, at the peaceful green fields of the Shire. Is he getting over Thorin, he wonders, or is he only growing numb?

"I think I did," he says finally. "A great deal. Is that what you wanted to know?"

Drogo releases the door. "Yes. That, and to tell you - that you are not alone. That you can come to the rest of us any time you need. You have been through a lot, Bilbo Baggins. Hobbits take care of their own."

He blinks, and she turns and continues down the slope, out of sight.

 

* * *

 

That night, he has the dream again.

He walks across the ice, and he drops to his knees at Thorin's side. The dwarf's face is streaked with blood, and he lies spread-eagled near the edge of the cliff.

"Bilbo," he begins to say, and the familiar pain starts up in Bilbo's chest. This time he doesn't let Thorin finish his sentence.

"No," he says. He puts a hand on Thorin's chest, to one side of the fatal wound. "No, I don't want to hear how sorry you are that I shared in your perils. It was a gift, Thorin. It was the gift of a lifetime, and I couldn't have asked for anything more."

He expects Thorin to start his death speech anyway, as nothing Bilbo has done in past dreams has ever changed Thorin's actions. But this time, although Thorin opens his mouth, he remains silent. Blood drips slowly down his chin. His eyes, the most beautiful blue Bilbo has ever seen, fix on the hobbit's face. Bilbo wants to remember them like this, pure and piercing and clean, not shadowed by dragon sickness. Those eyes are what makes a King, Bilbo thinks.

Thorin swallows, at great effort. "You have great courage, halfling," he says.

"This isn't about me," wails Bilbo. Cold seeps through his trousers, freezing his knees. "It's about you, Thorin! You! Why do you have to be so _noble?_ Why do you always have to die?"

"Always?" queries Thorin, raising an eyebrow. "I'm sorry, I wasn't aware that I'd died before."

The humor is out of place and brings Bilbo back to the moment. He laughs - a bitter laugh, but a laugh all the same. He knows this is a dream, but it is still good to see the crinkle at the corner of Thorin's eyes, to see that face crease in a smile once more. Even if the smile is pained and brief.

"Oh, Thorin," he breathes.

"Bilbo, listen," coughs Thorin. "I haven't much time - "

"No, you listen." Bilbo takes a deep breath and looks down at the dying dwarf before him. "I've got a lot of things to say, and I'd better say them now." _It's only a dream,_ a dark voice whispers in the back of his mind. Bilbo recognizes it as the ring, the One Ring that now sits in an envelope in his dresser, whispering and scheming and corrupting. _It's only a dream, the real Thorin will never hear you. He's dead, dead, dead, dead..._

_I know,_ thinks Bilbo fiercely.  _I know, and I don't care._

While he struggles, Thorin has grown weaker beneath him. Bilbo looks down and his words desert him, his careful speeches and promises leave him bereft and in tears.

"Forget it," he sobs. "This is enough. This will have to be enough."

He bends down and kisses Thorin, and for a moment there is a great terror trembling inside him that _this is it, this is the end all over again, this is the time when you kiss him and he dies, over and over and over again_ and then Thorin's hand alights weakly on his back, and Thorin kisses him back and everything is good and well and wonderful again. The tears on Bilbo's face mix with the blood on Thorin's. They are two weary adventurers and they both just want to go home. The difference is that Thorin will never get to go home, and that will be enough for him, for he has saved Erebor for his people; and Bilbo will return home, safe and sound, and it will not be enough for him because he lost too much while he was away, and now he has changed and Bag End will never be enough again.

"You will have to make it enough," breathes Thorin against his lips. Because this is a dream, and of course Thorin understands everything that Bilbo is trying to say but cannot, and everything that he does say but can't understand.

They are both already home, in the end.

 

* * *

 

Bilbo wakes. It is night, and Bag End is quiet. The moonlight shines through his windows into rooms still slightly too empty, shelves missing books and floors missing rugs. Bilbo sits up and swings his feet over the edge of his bed so that his toes touch the floor.

As he walks past his dresser, he can hear the ring whispering: ever so soft, ever so quiet. _Not tonight,_ thinks Bilbo, _Nor any night for a long time._ He walks past it, his bare feet padding silently over the floorboards.

Outside the moonlight is twice as bright and the stars twinkle bravely down. Without hesitation, Bilbo walks out past the flowers to where he planted Thorin's acorn. He stands over it for a long moment, afraid to look down, but afraid to look anywhere else.

_Thorin,_ he asks the stars, _What if I forget you? Years from now, when I am an old hobbit and every day takes me further away from my adventure, how will I recall everything that happened? Will I still dream of you dying?_

Somehow, he feels like he will not.

With careful movements, Bilbo Baggins kneels in the dirt. His hands are gentle as he pushes apart the soil.

There. A gentle sprig of green uncoils from the dirt, rising upward with the grace and elegance of an Elf.

Outside in his garden before dawn, Bilbo Baggins cries for the last time over the loss of Thorin Oakenshield.

**Author's Note:**

> So there you have it: I'm a terrible person who loves angst, but on the other hand I do feel a bit better now!  
> Any inaccuracies are wholly my fault. I don't remember every detail about the Hobbit and I'm too lazy to go look it up. Parts of it are intentional, though, like Thorin's last words, the odd capitalization and the use of 'Master' as an honorific. If you have a question about one of those, please feel free to talk to me about it. c:  
> Thank you for reading!


End file.
